His Quilted Northern
by polka-dotted-pengiuns
Summary: Lily Evans despises James Potter. Law of nature, no? But thanks to a reluctantly enlightening conversation with Remus Lupin, Lily Evans is forced to see that James Potter, the metaphorical toilet paper on the bottom of her shoe, isn't as bad as she though


**His Quilted Northern**

Disclaimer- no mine, no sue, everybody wins.

Lily parted with her friends and headed to the charms classroom, her dread increasing with every step she took. It wasn't the class she hated, no she loved the class, she had one of the highest grades in the year.

It was the people.

Oh, yes. The marauders, how she loved them. One would hope you noticed the rather blatant sarcasm that accompanies this thought. If not, then you are completely obvlious to the world around you, because this is a well known fact.

Lily hated the marauders, Sirius, with his too cool for school attitude, James, Mr. I _think _I'm Too Sexy for my Shirt . She should have never lent him that CD. Peter, for worshiping the ground that they walked on, and Remus, for not just leaving them to skive off classes and blow up potions on their own, he was better than that.

That, and she was still mad about the whole she-man prank back in fourth year.

She took her desk, and imagine that! There was a little piece of parchment. It never failed, she hated the parchment almost as much as the marauders themselves. But that would only make sense, due to the fact that it was one of the marauders who left them on her desk. Every freaking day.

Mr. I'm Too Sexy for my Shirt, himself.

Every day there was a little piece of parchment on her desk, waiting for her in charms. And every day it bore the same message.

_Please?_

Lily glared at the parchment as if it were the cause of all her adolescent problems. James Potter was like. . .

Lily struggled for the correct analogy.

Like the toilet paper on the bottom of her shoe. She grinned, proud of herself.

He was exactly like the toilet paper you found stuck to the bottom of your shoe. The kind that no matter how many people tell you about it, no matter how hard you scrape, the stupid toilet paper refused to come off. It was like it was super-glued to the bottom of your shoe, never to come off again. Like you'd have to live your life with that little piece of toilet paper tailing you, where ever you went.

Lily sighed and picked up the tiny scrap, she unfolded it and read the message that it bared. Expecting to have to yell across the room, "Never!" but she never got the chance today. Because today, it bore a different message, the words,

_I'll never give up Lily Evans_

She cocked her head, as if the movement would clear her vision and the parchment would show it's true words.

But it didn't. The words stayed the same. For the first time in four years of little pieces of parchment, the message had changed.

She couldn't pay attention at all during the lesson, she was too busy puzzling over what happened with the message on the parchment, the writing was the same, the ink was the same, the parchment was even the same as yesterdays. Only the words had changed.

She didn't understand. _Why_ had it changed?

There was no choice, she would have to do it. She would have to willingly confront a marauder. She waited until the bell rang loudly, startling poor professor Flitwick off his pile of books. She went over and helped him up and looked at the four boys.

She couldn't talk to James, it would inflate his head even more if he knew that she actually read and thought about the pieces of parchment. They'd have to stab it with a quill to make it deflate enough for him to walk out the door.

She couldn't talk to Sirius, because even though he would listen and give good advice, he would also run off and tell James every word, which would result in previously mentioned inflation of the head.

She couldn't talk to Peter because, well, she wondered if he even _knew _about the daily notes, much less a change in them.

She'd confront Remus.

"Hey, Remus!" She shouted.

"Yeah?" He called back.

"Can I talk to you for a minute?"

Remus just smiled at James' murderous glares.

"Sure."

The rest of the marauders went to lunch, after Remus promised that he'd meet up with them when he was done.

Lily sat in a desk and Remus joined her, pushing a desk over to face hers.

"You. . . wanted to talk to me?

"Yes I did," Lily responded in a very business like tone. She pulled the parchment out of her bag.

"Why'd he change the message?" She asked handing Remus the parchment.

"Well, after you didn't really seem to grasp the concept, he decided to spell it out for you. Literally. He'll never give up. Just as it says."

She stared at the parchment.

"Why me?" she asked, genuinely curious. "He's rich, his parents are famous, he can have any girl, why is he so intent on having me?"

Lily looked hopefully up at Remus. "Can you tell him to just go torture some other poor innocent girl? Please?"

"No," He said, with a small smile, "And I know you cant possibly be this blind."

Lily returned this statement with a blank look.

"Or, maybe you can," he sighed. "Lily, he really cares for you—

"Whatever, he—

"No Lily, just listen. Every time you turn him down, he becomes more determined than ever. He once wrote backwards across his forehead, 'Evans, Roses, 10 galleons,' to make absolutely sure that he'd remember your Valentines Day gift, which you threw away, if I remember correctly. He has written you hundreds of poems, which you burn. He's stopped cursing Snape on a daily basis, he's slowed on the pranking. He's even paying attention in class. I don't know what more you want from the kid, but he'll do it.You're just determined to hate him."

"Remus, he just wants me to add to his trophy collection. All the boy thinks about is pranks, girls, and food."

"That's not true."

Lily was taken aback at how strongly he said it,but he was just determined to see the good in James.

"Oh, really? He takes nothing seriously. He thinks life is one big joke, one big prank, he hasn't done one compassionate thing in his life."

"That's not true, either," said Remus just as strongly.

"Really?" She said skeptically.

"_Yes_, really."

"And what noble deed has he performed lately," Lily scoffed, "Did he helped an old lady safely cross the street—

"Lily, _stop_." Said Remus firmly. She did, this was as much of Remus' temper she had ever seen. She also thought it was a smart choice, seeing how Remus was president of the Dueling Club.

"James has done a lot for me. He's done a lot of _compassionate_ things for me, and Peter, and Sirius. But you just don't want to believe it, and I'll say it again, you're determined to hate him. If you could just look past an old grudge, if you would just put it behind you for once in your life, then you'll actually see James. And you might just like what you see. A lot of people do."

Remus stood, "He's not going to give up." He smiled at her, "Now, I've got to go eat lunch with Peter, Sirius, and _James."_

And Lily, against her better judgement, took his advice. But only to see what made him so determined, what kept him going when she constantly turned him down. And, as Remus hoped, it worked.

She began to see that the toilet paper on her shoe wasn't as bad as she thought. It wasn't the cheepo brand that was thin, and flimsy, and felt like wax paper on one's bum. But more like the nice kind, that was thick and quilted and had that double lining that made it softer.

James Potter did appear to have two sides to him. When he was around a lot of people, he was loud, and funny, and obnoxious. He pranked and drew attention to himself like Girl Scouts to cookies.

But when it was just him and his friends, he was different, he was still funny, but he was nice. He was patient with Peter when he just couldn't get his homework, he'd laugh with Sirius when he got another horrible letter from his mother, and he'd just talk and listen to Remus when nobody else had the attention span or intelligence. He knew what the people close to him wanted and he would do his best to make sure they had it.

Lily Evans made up her mind.

Lily walked down the hallway to charms, this time smiling. Smiling for the same reason that had her moaning and groaning desperately before.

She walked over to her desk and opened the note, smiled broadly at Remus, and did the unthinkable.

For the first time ever, Lily Evans wrote James Potter a reply.

She slipped a little piece of parchment on his desk before he sat down that read,

_You've got one chance._

James was on a permanent high for the rest of the week.

Yes, Lily had decided, James Potter was like the toilet paper on the bottom of her shoe, but the toilet paper that you give up trying to scrape off on to a sidewalk,and just leave there. The toilet paper that makes you respond "Yeah, so," when someone points it out in the middle of the hallway. The toilet paper that you become strangely fond of. The toilet paper that wasn't going anywhere, because he was her Charmin Ultra and she was his Quilted Northern. And everybody needed toilet paper right? It's just that hers wasn't in the cabinet, or on one of those nifty little cardboard rolls.

No, Lily Evans' toilet paper was annoyingly placed on the bottom of her shoe.

And it was stuck there as if it had been super-glued. Never to come off again.

A/N— I've had this written forever, I've just never got around to posting it. I like it, and I hope you do too. I would have posted it earlier today if we hadn't had to go to my cousins' graduation party. But that was a lot of fun, and I wouldn't have rather been there than typing, to tell you the truth. Chapter five of And So It Began is coming soon. I just have to get through finals, SCHOOLS OVER ON THE 24TH! YAY!

Yeah, i gave this a much needed edit. 5/21/06


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